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The Crimson Fists are getting reinforcements, hand over fist. My 1980s Rogue Trader Space Marine grows with the addition of another 5-man Tactical Squad composed of vintage metal and plastic Citadel Miniatures from another era.

Squad Huerta, ready to put the huert on.

To my amazement and envy, in the time taken to finish this second squad of Battle at the Farm Crimson Fists, Nico has painted every Crimson Fist for the scenario, plus he’s modelled an evocative scenic base, plus he’s painted all the Orks and – if that wasn’t enough – some Ork reinforcements. I feel like Falcon running round the park and being lapped repeatedly in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Freehand & Crimson Fist Icons

Again I had some fun adding freehand chapter icons and armour graffitti to the squad. “THE TRUTH HUERTS” is just punning off the Sergeant’s name. “INFINITE PLASMA” is a reference to the Battle at the Farm scenario, which Zhu points out gives the Space Marines unlimited Plasma Missiles (as they normally cost 1 point each, it technically means the Marines outclass the Orks by INFINITY POINTS).

I now need to paint a second Missile Launcher so I can reference Elton John’s Rocket Man.

“FOR NOW WE SEE BUT THRU A SCANNER DARKLY” on the Marine with scanner is a 1 Corinthians 13:12 / Philip K. Dick reference simply because he’s holding a scanner. “FIST OR FAMINE” is from my handy stockpile of fist-based puns. It’s a treat at the end of the painting process to choose some scrawly handwriting to give the battle-brothers an additional touch of the Rogue Trader era

Crimson Fists Grand Plan

To fit in to my planned 1,000 points (using the Whitescars army list from the Book of the Astronomican) the five Space Marines come out as:

Here are the two squads in action alongside each other, with a sneaky eleventh Citadel Miniature tucked away somewhere … can you spot it?

Squads Huerta and Onan fighting in the ruins of Blas in the Gallego system.

Crimson Fists Painting Tutorial

I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how I paint Crimson Fists, so I photographed a Marine inbetween each step of the blue power armour process.

If you want to see these steps broken down, with the techniques and theory behind them spelt out the tutorial is available on Patreon. The skills you’ll learn are transferable to all colours of power armour.

Coming soon – more vintage Crimson Fists to creep the army closer to game legal.

It's Age of Sigmar time! Here's a nine-strong cluster of Grot Scuttlings from the modern (gasp!) Warhammer Quest Silver Tower game. There's only eight in the box, but I painted a bonus one as PRAISE BE TO TZEENTCH.

Spider-Grots, Spider-Grots, manufactured in Notts.

Mashing together Night Goblins with sp-sp-spiders puzzles me – Forest Goblins were the spider-flavoured Goblins from Warhammer, so it's confusing the themes. Like mashing up High Elves with leafs. Or Khorne Berserkers with sonic sex-weaponry. It seems Gee-Dub haven't continued the arachno-trend with the subsequent Night Goblin (or "Moonclan Grot" as they're now called) releases, and these spider-hybrids ("sp-ybrids"?) are confined to Tzeentch's Silver Tower. Moonclan have found their feet, and it's not eight-a-grot.

Spin a web any size, catch Orruks just like flies.

To emphasise the Tzeentchian nature of these Scuttlings I avoided the classic Night Goblin black-robes-green-skin scheme and went for pale blue flesh and vivid purple robes. My Silver Tower 1990s project will feature Scuttlings converted from the classic Kev Adams Night Goblins, and they may borrow this scheme to reinforce how they're not your standard Night Goblins.

Normal Oldhammer service will resume shortly with some charmingly vintage Bob Olley Tzaangor. Have fun!

Thanks foxtail! If really love digging into the history and context of old minatures. I've been trying to join up some of the Citadel Catalogue 2 I had as a kid with the repurposed Lord of the Rings range.

Thanks SaintToad! I've got some more Crimson Fists very shortly.

This miniature is a mystery – an unreleased Warhammer treasure from the vaults of Citadel Miniatures. Who is he? Why have I got (perhaps) the only casting in existence?

The vibe of the figure is more historical than fantastical – the moustache, crested helm and scalemail give it a very Romano-Germanic kingdom vibe. It feels like an Alan or Michael Perry sculpt judging by this face and care put into the armour detailing. In fact it’s a bit too historically accurate to fit in with Citadel’s F3 Barbarian or F6 Barbarian Raider ranges, or the ADD21 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons mounted barbarian. The closest thing released by Citadel are the F7 Mounted Barbarian Raiders.

F7 Mounted Barbarian Raiders. Image from solegends.

The Mounted Barbarian Raiders were released at a time when the line between historical and fantasy figures was blurred, with Warhammer’s Empire, Norse, Bretonnian and Dogs of War ranges doing double-service as various historical Europeans. It’s conceivable that Citadel had plans for a Warhammer race with a strong Romano-Germanic design elements, and this General was a testpiece.

I gave my General one of the F7 horses as it’s coetaneous, and he deserves a bodyguard of these classics at a future point. I modelled the horse forward on the raised base so that when the planned regiment ranks up he will ride slightly above and ahead.

Then as I was researching colours a thought struck me. Is this mystery figure a … Blandford Warrior? He fits beautifully with the released Blandford Warriors in terms of style and scale.

The 13th (Blandford) Warrior.

The Medieval Warlords book comprises seven chapters each detailing a different warlord, and Games Workshop released miniatures for only six of these characters. The warlord that appears as a chapter but not a miniature was Genseric – general of one of the most famous Romano-Germanic kingdoms. I think this figure could be him.

Genseric led the Vandals from the heartlands of the crumbling Roman Empire to Africa and around the Mediterranean region until they stormed Rome itself, looting its treaures. The incident stuck in the West’s poplar imagination, and ever since the word “vandal” has been a byword for destroying property.

I used the Karl Briullov painting above as the basis for my miniature’s colour scheme. I love the satanically-black horse implying he’s the Pope’s archnemesis – but the menace is rather undermined by the pink leggings and ruby red shoes.

I painted the shield with an Arianist symbol – I’d like to stress this was the form of Christianity that took off in the Romano-Germanic kingdoms and was named after Arius and NOTHING TO DO WITH ARYANISM. (After all those “arian symbol german” google searches I think I’ve been put on a list.)

Genseric and his bucellarius on the outskirts of Carthage.

Not Genseric.

Regardless of the figure’s true identity, it’s now definitely part of my Late Imperial Roman army and will get some outings in SAGA when I’ve painted enough for a 4-point warband … coming soon.

If you’ve got any theories or information on the figure, please please let me know in the comments.

This is a wonderful thread that I have somehow missed. I regret that as the photography and painting are sensational! I aspire to one day take pictures as good as yours. I look forward to future updates!

Thanks Krule! Thanks ekipage! I got totally down the rabbithole of the mini's history. I've got a follow up set of minis planned for this year off the back of what I'm still learning.

Thanks Kuribo! I like to push my photographs as far as I can.

Lone Lemming – I worked on White Dwarf for years. I'm past the doing magazine stage :P

British comics lost an icon this week with the death of Carlos Ezquerra – the creative genius behind Judge Dredd and Johnny Alpha. Carlos’s character designs and universes underpin a lot of subsequent science fiction – including Warhammer 40,000. Two years before Games Workshop gave birth to Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader, they were dabbling with science fiction miniatures such as this trio of Strontium Dog characters.

Left to right: Wulf Sternhammer, Johnny Alpha, Gronk.

I’ve been painting this triumverate of bounty hunters with an eye on Warlord Games’ new Strontium Dog game. Excitingly they can also be shoehorned into modern Necromunda with the recent bounty hunter rules.

The miniatures are from Citadel’s 2000AD range produced for the 1985 Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game. Though technically Johnny Alpha and Judge Dredd inhabit separate universes, they have crossed over several times for reasons of awesome.

Johnny Alpha and Judge Dredd, Judgement Day, 2000AD #799.

The Rogue Trader universe borrows a lot of its overall look from Carlos Ezquerra’s artwork. The amount of time and artwork the Rogue Trader rulebook spends on the (non-Chaotic) random mutations tables is testament to Strontium Dog’s influence. There’s a lot of Strontium Dog wargear that pops up in the forty-first millennium too, such as gravchutes, stasis grenades and electro-mauls.

But wait – there’s more…

[size=18pt]The Rogue Trader Mystery[/size]

There was a mystery for almost thirty years about the miniature that appears in a single murky black-and-white photograph on page 11 of the Rogue Trader rulebook.

The mystery figure, top left corner.

The figure never made it into production, appearing only in this photo. Only in 2013 did details of the figure emerge thanks to Steve Casey’s Eldritch Epistles – it was a one of several Judge Dredd figures that had been converted and cast up in-house to playtest the upcoming Rogue Trader rules before actual miniatures had been made.

It was released a couple of years later by Wargames Foundry, so people like me and Rochie can paint and play with our own copies of this odd curio.

Inquisitor Ezquerra and Johnny Alpha.

I plumped for white and papal purple to spin the figure as an Imperial Inquisitor. (It was tempting to paint him in green and yellow trousers, as if it’s Johnny improvising a disguise as an Imperial Inquisitor.) He’s so wee. being from 1985 when sculptors tended to 25mm scale, that I built up his base to help him keep some sense of imposing Imperial authority over the rest of the Imperium’s servants.

Albion Truthsayers: the most predictable opponents in "Truth or Dare".

The Albion Truthsayer is a standing-stone-cold classic of a miniature from Warhammer’s Dark Shadows mini-supplement. The 2001 campaign booklet featured rules for you army to be joined these warrior-wizards (or their arch-nemeses, the Dark Emissaries) while they fought their way across the mysterious island of Albion to thwart (or aid) Warhammer’s newest mega-villain: the Dark Master.

The Truthsayer, interfering with one of the many barrows on the Isle of Wights.

I had a lot of fun modelling the base to make it look like the boggy fenlands of Albion. The owl (from a Wood Elf kit) is a reference the “Wings of Fate” spell that let the Truthsayer summon a flock of enchanted birds to peck at his foes. The sculpt itself is packed full of Celtic-style details: a spiral skull carvings, gold neck torque; spiked barbarian hair; bronze triskele medallion. As a geek of ancient trappings I get super excited about it appearing in Warhammer.

When it comes to prehistoric jewellery, Curis not only walks the walk, but torques the torque.

This miniature is one of my favourite Citadel Miniatures of all time – not least because if you clip off his basing tab and peek up the loincloth you can see the sculptor’s – Chris Fitzpatrick – signature. I can’t think of any miniatures signed in this way since Citadel’s preslotta days.

Cheeky Albion Truthsayer upskirt shot.

[size=18pt]Albion Skin Painting Tutorial[/size]

One of the popular requests on the Ninjabread Patreon is “how do you paint skin”? I photographed the Truthsayer between steps so supporters can follow along and learn how to paint flesh in this style.

Become a supporter today and you’ll get access to this in depth masterclass tutorial, and not one BUT TWO guides on how to paint your power armoured Space Marines.

That’s it for today’s visit to Albion. What’s next – perhaps the evil Truthsayer? Or the Fenbeasts? Or the Giants of Albion and their Druid? Or maybe delving even further back into Albion’s past with the LE8 McDeath’s Crazed Caledonians? Watch this space…